women’s Equality and Gay Civil Rights

BY JUDITH SUTPHEN

Commission on Women
voted unanimously tojoin
the Vermont Freedom to
Marry Task Force in support

In 1996, the Governor’s

of gay marriage. This past"

summer, the Commission
chose to honor the six
Supreme Court plaintiffs at a
Boston convention of the
National Association of
Commissions on Women.
Clearly, the Commission’s
support of gay marriage is
both long-standing and strong.

So why do those who sup-
port women’s rights also care
about the right of lesbians and
gays to marry‘?

Many of the roaring battles
in the 19th century about the
status of women were precur-
sors to today’s gay marriage
debate — whether women
should have the vote; whether
contraception should be legal;
whether married women
should be free to own proper-
ty; have custody of their chil-
dren, or hold jobs. Much of
the fight over same—sex mar-
riage is a fight—by-proxy over
one of the last strongholds of
gender supremacy — the idea
that a man rules a woman, that
a woman without a man is
missing something essential,
that a man who seeks another
man is degrading himself by
turning into a woman.

Once the theory of male
supremacy and female inferi-
ority is dismantled — the theo-
ry that man must rule and
woman must serve — there is
no longer any justification for
barring marriage between two
women or two men. Once
women and men are truly
equal — a still distant goal —
choosing their work both
within and outside marriage as

earner, nurturer, cook, or
householder based on their
desires and talents, rather than
on gender, then what bars two
women or two men from mar-
rying?

lt’s hard these days for
most people to argue directly
against the idea of female

Much of the fight
over same-sex
marriage is a fight-
by—proxy over one
of the last strong-
holds of gender
supremacy the
idea that a man
rules a woman,
that a woman with-
out a man is miss-
ing something
essential, that a
man who seeks
another man is _
degrading himself
by turning into a
woman.

equality — at least here in
Vermont. Instead, many of
those who oppose female
equality aim their harsher lan-
guage at lesbians and gay
men, calling them unnatural,
just as our great-grandmothers
were called unnatural for
wanting to own property or
use birth control.

 
 
 

Bias against lesbian and
gay relationships is based on
the belief that the anatomical
differences between women
and men necessarily entail dif-
ferent gender roles, including
the expectation that men
should “naturally” be attract-
ed only to women and that
women should “naturally”
only be attracted to men.
Same sex marriage under-
mines the myth that women
and men “naturally” assume
complementary gender roles,
and thus -threatens the stereo-
typical assumptions that have
been used to limit women’s
opportunities and to keep
women in their “proper”
place.

Calls.for women’s rights
and gay rights defy gender
norms. Yes, as groups, women
and men are different, but one
can’t take the broad general-
ization and apply it like a
cookie cutter to all individu-
als. Whittling, chipping, or
hacking away at stereotyped
and outmoded notions of the
“proper” roles for women and
men has been at the heart of
the 152-year-old women’s
rights movement, as well as
the more recent gay and les-
bian civil rights movement.

There are many ways to be
female or male; that is, to be
human. A truly egalitarian
society makes room for those
differences. When marriage is
defined as a commitment to
live up to the rigorous
demands of love and to care
for each other as best as you
can, then the right to marry for
any Vermonter should be wel-
comed by all of us.V

Judith Sutphen is executive
director of the Governor ‘s
Commission on Women.

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